Focusing on the relationship between two fiercely independent women--Teresa, a writer, and Alicia, an artist--this epistolary novel was written as a tribute to Julio Cortázar's Hopscotch and examines Latina forms of love, gender conflict, and female friendship. Ana Castillo's groundbreaking first novel, The Mixquiahuala Letters, received an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation and is widely studied as a feminist text on the nature of self-conflict.
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"A wonderful, wonderful book." --Maxine Hong Kingston
"Like a disciplined athlete, Castillo makes even the most difficult moves look easy." --San Francisco Chronicle
"Like a disciplined athlete, Castillo makes even the most difficult moves look easy." --San Francisco Chronicle
From the Publisher
The first novel by the noted Chicana poet, this is an epistolary novel in the tradition of Cortozor's Hopscotch. It focuses on the friendship between two strong and fiercely independent Hispanic women and examines Mexican and Hispanic forms of love and gender conflict and the role thal female friendships play within it.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Profoundly Dull,
By Comma Splice (Texas) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Mixquiahuala Letters (Paperback)
I respect Ana Castillo and think that The Guardians, especially, was a fine novel, and so I hate to give The Mixquiahuala Letters a negative review. But it simply didn't work for me. Just not at all.
It's the (sort of) story of two women, one a white American artist, Alicia, and one a Chicana poet, Teresa, who meet in an artists' retreat. They forge a friendship and proceed to experience several adventures in Mexico, falling into dangerous situations at every turn, and they help to support one another in their efforts to build successful creative careers and to build and sustain relationships. The stories are told through letters posted from Teresa to Alicia, and they are collected in a "choose-your-own-adventure" sort of structure, as Castillo lays out and recommends three orders--for the Conformist, the Cynic, and the Quixotic--in which to read the letters. The novel didn't work for me for several reasons. First, the characters are flat and lifeless. The men, especially, are just horrible caricatures. I don't think that Alicia and Teresa, especially when they're in Mexico, meet a man who doesn't want to rape them. Even Teresa and Alicia, though, are lifeless. Many of the letters read as though they are Teresa's psychological diagnosis of Alicia, and that's how Alicia is in the novel, an object, a psychological specimen or symbol, rather than a human. The characters are lifeless, here to make Castillo's points. The choose-your-own-adventure pattern of the story is a barrier, too, to me for entering the story. I've always thought that a part of what is special and powerful about the novel is the ability it offers for you to sort of share the consciousness of the character or narrator, to enter into that figure's mind and story. That's why the novel is an important tool for promoting justice for marginalized people such as Chicana women; it allows the reader to empathize. The choose-your-own-adventure structure, though, made this novel too much about me. Lastly, and most importantly, The Mixquiahuala Letters didn't work just because it was boring. It really was. Besides some brief moments when the characters are in Mexico, nothing happens. I read this with a classroom full of graduate students (all of whom would have been considered sympathetic to Castillo's perspective), and I think that we were pretty united in finding this novel uniquely dull. It almost shouldn't be called a novel. It's, instead, a thought-piece and would have been more successful as an essay.
8 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Anyone can relate,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Mixquiahuala Letters (Paperback)
Have you ever felt disenfranchised either because you are a person of color, a woman, an outsider? Like you did not fit in but forced you way in anyway? Like the way you choose was a bit dangerous but still you loved it? Castillo captures those feelings and the ones we have when we share those wonderful crazy moments with someone of the same sex. Camaraderie and sisterhood is a theme that is woven into every word she writes. I recommend this book for entertainment and if it is required for a class then just consider yourself lucky.
4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Castillo's Best Work,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Mixquiahuala Letters (Paperback)
This is by far the best work that Ana Castillo has published. The letters are moving and passionate. A must for any Chicanas or feminists
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